


Suspect

by GoldenPyrite



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Evil!Lance, Gen, Screw it - Freeform, but you know what, now it's a one shot, or so you think, sorry the ending is so abrupt, thanks galra crystal, the castle malfunctions a lot, there are no ships in this au sorry, this was gonna be a series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-05
Updated: 2016-11-05
Packaged: 2018-08-29 06:37:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8479048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GoldenPyrite/pseuds/GoldenPyrite
Summary: Keith discovers that there’s a spy among the Voltron team, but doesn’t know who exactly it is. Turns out, Lance is the prime suspect.





	

Keith still remembered the events of the Galra crystal invading the castle’s system. It had happened a few months ago, but the memories were vivid. That’s why, when it happened again, he was suspicious. They’d rid the Galra crystal from their system a long while ago, so why was the castle acting up again?

The same, creepy events were happening. Another gladiator was on the loose, the food goo hose was spraying everywhere, and the lights would flash on and off, showing eerie holograms Keith couldn’t make out. He crept down the hallway, bayard out, and rounded the corner, coming face to face with Allura.

“Keith!” She exclaimed, still dressed in her armor from an hour ago. They had just come back from visiting another planet when the castle’s system went haywire. Allura was locked out of the control room and couldn’t shut it off. The generator rooms and the lion bays were shut down as well. They were trapped in the middle of space.

“Hey, Allura, have you seen the rest of the team?”

“Coran, Hunk, and Pidge are trying to find a way through the vents to the generator or the control room. Shiro was just with me, but I think he went to find Lance. And well, we can’t find Lance.”

“Lance, huh? Did that idiot get stuck in another airlock?”

“No, actually. All exits, including the airlocks, are shut off. He could be anywhere.”

Keith found that semi-suspicious. Lance wouldn’t just run off in a time like this. It was a possibility he could be trapped in any of the locked rooms, but he doubted Lance would be that stupid. “Allura, did you hear anyone in the control room when you found it locked?”

She frowned. “No. I just tried to override the entry panel but it didn’t work. So I left.”

“I think we should check the locked rooms again. Lance might be in there.”

“Oh, that must be it.” She nearly laughed. “Why does he always get into these situations?”

/////

“Lance! Lance, are you in there?” Keith pounded on the metal door to the control room, even hit it a few times with his bayard. “Lance!”

“Keith? Keith! The castle’s gone crazy again!” He could hear a faint yell from the other side. Lance, thank god. “Keith, you got to get me out of here!”

“Hold on, Lance!” Keith began slicing at the door while Allura frantically tried to controls at the door.

“It’s still not working!” Allura hissed, hitting the controls frustratingly. “I could’ve sworn all the crystal venom was out of our system. I guess I was wrong.”

Suddenly, the doors to the control room opened and Lance stumbled out, falling flat on his face. “Ow.” He groaned, rubbing his chin.

After helping Lance up, Keith peered inside the control room. It looked just as it had when they last were in it. Nothing was out of place and the controls were off. All they could see was the vastness of space through the large glass panes. What exactly had gone wrong?

Allura immediately ran to the controls and began typing furiously. She stared at the screen confused. “I don’t know what went wrong. Our system looks fine. The Galra crystal was completely flushed out a while ago. There was no way the system had a reason to do anything like this.” She looked panicked, almost. “This is extremely strange. I might have to look into this.”

Keith had to agree with her. It was really weird for the system to go bonkers when there was nobody in the castles or at the controls. Then Keith froze. Lance had been the only one in the control room. He couldn’t have possibly caused it, could he? Even if it was on accident, Lance wasn't stupid enough to mess with the system. He knew how important it was to functioning the castle.

“Allura, since Lance was in here, it isn’t possible he could’ve done it, right?”

She paused to think. “Hmm, I suppose it could’ve been. But we have gone over this enough times for him to know that he has no such permission to touch that panel. The information within the system is far too great.”

Keith nodded. “Yeah, he probably was just an idiot and got stuck.”

Allura laughed. “Yes. Well do not doubt him too much. If you were in his situation, you would’ve done the same thing.”

/////

It happened again two weeks later. It was in the middle of the night this time. Keith had woken up to his lights flashing on and off. When he ran out, he noticed everyone else was already up, gathered in the kitchen. Once again, Lance was nowhere to be seen.

“Lance, where’s Lance?” Shiro asked as Keith walked into the room.

It took Keith a second, and then it was like a lightbulb going off in his head. “Did you guys check the control room?”

“Don’t tell me he got stuck in there again.” Allura scowled. “I guess we have to check.”

The team all ran together to the control room, wary of any haywire obstacles in the way. Keith hoped they didn’t have to face another gladiator or two. As they approached the hallway to the control room, all lights in the castles suddenly went off. The team broke into a frenzy, especially Hunk.

“Everyone stay calm.” Shiro said loud enough for everyone to hear. His arm started glowing, just enough to see a few feet in front of them. The purple light fluctuated, and Shiro led them the rest of the way to the control room. The door was, of course, closed and sealed. Allura could not override the access panel and Keith could not hack open the door.

And, just as it had two weeks ago, the doors opened suddenly. Except this time, Lance didn’t fall out. In fact, Lance was nowhere to be seen. Allura frustratingly stormed into the control room, accessing the system, finding that nothing was wrong. “I can’t believe it happened again! I double-checked the system and nothing could possibly be making it do this!” She let out a sigh, fingers flying across the keys. Then she gasped. “Someone has been accessing data from the system. The older files have been breached and some of them are missing. The system even says so. Which means— “

“—we have a rat on board.” Keith finished, and his mind instantly went to Lance. Lance not only goes missing every time the castle goes berserk, but has been distant from the team for the past few weeks. He doesn’t talk or joke as much as he used to and disappears during the day or while they’re resting. He never tells anyone where he’s going either, which just raises the suspicion more. But Keith kept his thoughts to himself, because despite the evidence that led to Lance as the prime suspect of these anomalies, he couldn’t be sure just yet.

/////

Keith began following Lance for the next week. The first few days were nothing. Lance attended the daily trainings and came to all the meals. He was only in his room for minutes at a time or when the castle’s lights dimmed, when everyone had fallen asleep. Even at night, Lance did not leave his room. 

In the next few days, Keith’s suspicions started growing. Lance would miss trainings more often and always skipped lunch. Keith always volunteered to search for Lance during lunch. It wasn’t like Lance could leave the castle without Blue or a pod. Blue always sat idly in the dock and all pods were still in their capsules. But Keith never found wherever Lance disappeared off to. 

As Keith’s paranoia grew, Shiro became worried about his teammate and friend. Shiro constantly told Keith not to worry, that whatever Lance was doing was his business and his only. 

Still, the next day when Lance skipped lunch, Keith finished his food quickly and headed for the blue paladin’s room. The room was strangely neat. The bed was made, the chair was tucked into the desk, and the floor wasn't covered in strewn clothes and armor. The neatness was so unlike Lance.

Keith’s first instinct was to search the drawers in the desk. He looked through all six, only finding random books for the castle’s tiny library and various souvenirs from different planets (they looked a lot cooler now than they had when he first presented them to the team). Otherwise, there was nothing of significance. 

He began searching around Lance’s bed, looking underneath for any boxes and in the nightstand drawers as well. Just as his luck was wearing thin, Keith discovered a couple of papers stashed underneath Lance’s pillow. Hastily scrawled writing covered the paper. The first few papers were day-to-day schedules of the team’s activities; when they trained, ate meals, and when they went to sleep. But the last paper struck Keith’s curiosity. 

It listed four dates and times. Comparing the dates to the Earth calendar on Lance’s wall, Keith noticed two of the dates had passed, while the third was marked as today’s date and the last had yet to come. Keith thought hard about the significance of the dates and times, coming up with nothing. But when the answer finally hit him, he made an extreme breakthrough in his suspicions. 

The times matched up to the two times the castle had malfunctioned. Keith would know, since he had devoted most of his nights to thoroughly studying every detail of each malfunction. So either Lance was studying the same files as Keith, or he was responsible for the malfunctions.

Keith looked at the third time, then at Lance’s clock. His heart started pounding, as he compared the time on the paper to the time on the clock. There were three minutes until the third time.

He sprinted out of Lance’s room, dropping the paper somewhere in the rush. He turned through various hallways and twisted around corners, nearly barreling into Shiro and Pidge in the process. The black and green paladins looked confused, but kept walking anyways.

Keith activated his bayard and ran into the control room, finding Lance at the pedestal, surrounded by a blue particle barrier. The blue paladin turned to give Keith a surprised, but sly smile then turned back to typing into the castle’s database. The doors closed and locked behind Keith, trapping him inside with Lance. All communications were off as Lance made the castle malfunction for the third time. Keith, of course, didn’t have his helmet to talk with Allura or the rest of the team. He was alone on this one, with nothing but his bayard to help.

“Lance!” Keith yelled, pounding on the blue barrier between them. His bayard transformed into its usual sword, and Keith slashed and hacked at the barrier. “Stop! What are you doing?”

Lance didn’t reply, but turned around a few minutes later when the screens were blank. He had stopped typing to show Keith a small cube in his fingers, metal jutting from its top. Keith recognized the hard drive’s shape, but realized it was outlined with blue accents and glowed lightly. Lance put the hard drive inside his jacket and then the barrier vanished.

Keith didn’t waste any time. He lunged at Lance, his sword already swinging. But Lance blocked the sword strike with his bayard, knocking Keith off his feet. Not even a moment passed by before Keith felt a short burst of electricity burn through his neck. He let out a weak yell, then Lance’s face faded into black.

/////

Lance and Keith were gone by the time the castle reverted back to normal. Allura and Shiro, followed by the rest of the team, ran into the control room looking for their two lost teammates. Shiro frowned when they discovered no one was inside. “Keith was running off in this direction. If the doors were closed last time, he should be in here now.”

“And Lance is, as usual, not here.” Allura sighed. She positioned her hands on the controls again, looking for any traces of missing data. There was one, but the files had undoubtedly been rifled through. “We have nothing whatsoever on this case. I have never been so frustrated over a computer before.”

“Princess, I actually installed some tiny cameras into the room after the second incident.” Coran said, moving over to a section in the wall that, if looked at closely enough, was a disguised camera. “We can see if this picked up anything!”

“Brilliant, Coran! Play the feed now.”

Coran took the disk from the camera and inserted it into the control panel. The computer immediately began loading and showed separate sections for each day. Allura clicked on the current day and began playing the feed. Static could be heard, but the screen was black. Frowning, Allura reloaded the feed, but the screen was still black.

“Where's the video?”

“Maybe it just got the audio. We can still listen to that.” Pidge said and took the controls from Allura, quickly speeding forward. She stopped it at the time the castle started malfunctioning.

There was more static, but the sound of the control room doors opening and loud footsteps could also be heard. The footsteps, Shiro assumed, were Keith's.

 _“Lance! Stop!” ___

They continued to listen to Keith yell at Lance and use his bayard to hit something. Were they in some sort of trouble?

Suddenly, a yell came from the audio, then silence. A few minutes later into the audio recording, the sound of the doors came again and Shiro’s voice was heard. Then it ended.

“That's it? That's seriously it? There has to be more!” Hunk exclaimed. “What exactly happened to Lance and Keith?”

“We don't know. We’ve only got the audio.” Shiro replied, quite disappointed himself. From the sound of it, Keith and Lance were fighting or bickering. But they should still be the room, shouldn't they? The recording didn't play any sound of them leaving, only Shiro and the team entering. How could they have suddenly disappeared?

“One of the hatches is open over here. And there's a taser right on the ground next to the cover. You don't think Lance did this, do you?” Pidge asked, busying herself with the interior of the hatch as the others analyzed the audio.

Allura looked unhappy, and a little fearful. “It's entirely possibly, but for all our sakes and especially Lance’s, I hope it's not true.”

/////

Keith had spent the last ten minutes trying to remove the handcuffs restricting his wrists, to no avail. When he had come back to conscious twenty minutes ago, he found himself in an entirely other ship, with technologies nothing like the ones in the Castle of Lions or in the lions themselves. He was in some sort of small, back room, with blocky computers and large machines, cuffed to a chair. It didn’t look any more advanced than Earth technology, but clearly it had been modified and tampered with to fit the pilot’s needs.

Oh, right. The pilot.

Keith couldn’t believe Lance actually had the decency to _kidnap him ___and put him aboard a ship to who knows where. He hadn’t seen Lance since the stupid guy had electrocuted him, so he didn’t know if Lance was actually on board, but it was highly likely. His gloves and belt were missing, along with his bayard. Even the knife hidden in his boot was gone.

God, what was Keith going to tell the team? That only their most unsuspecting teammate had decided whatever he was trying to accomplish now was worth more than saving the universe?

When the doors opened, Keith was ready. He stood up, the chair hanging from his arms. Lance stepped inside and Keith swung.

The chair hit Lance right in the stomach, shattering upon impact. Flying splinters nicked Lance’s chin. It was a really, really stupid plan, but nonetheless, it knocked Lance to the ground and that was all that mattered. Keith sprinted out of the room, pausing for a moment to put his cuffed hands in front of his body. The keys, I need the keys.

He was running through random hallways and rooms when he finally found it. Not the keys, but Lance’s room. It was clearly his room, messy and scattered with maps, papers, and high-tech computers. A picture of a large family hung on the wall. Keith hurriedly searched through every drawer, trying to find the keys, but stopped a few times to read over a few papers.

The damn spy had been tracking them since the beginning. While it seemed Lance didn’t work for anyone but himself, he had been riffling through the castle’s database every chance he got. Records upon records of Altean information were printed out on the paper alongside a paper relating each Altean letter to an English letter. Lance had learned to decode Altean script to English, a feat none of the paladins nor Allura or Coran had accomplished in their time on the ship. Keith was too fascinated with the old legends Lance had managed to uncover to realize the door had opened.

Lance, with blood running down his chin, was aiming his bayard right at Keith.

With his hands still cuffed, Keith froze and rose his hands up slowly in mock surrender. Then he ducked to the right, avoiding a shot from Lance’s bayard, and ran straight for Lance. He was stopped halfway when a particularly large blast hit his shoulder and Keith let out a yell, falling backwards. He couldn’t even touch his shoulder to soothe the burned skin.

Lance was breathing heavily as he lowered his bayard, the weapon transforming back to its original state. He attached it to his hip and approached Keith, hauling the red paladin up by his injured shoulder. Keith hissed in pain, jerking away in Lance’s grasp.

“You fucking shot me!” Keith yelled accusingly.

“Oh shut up, Mullet Brain.” Lance rolled his eyes. He pulled a set of keys from his pocket (Keith almost cried. They had been in Lance’s jacket the whole time) and undid the cuffs, pushing Keith against the wall. Keith turned his head so his face wouldn’t swish into the wall. Then Lance promptly took out another set of cuffs, much heavier-duty ones, and pressed them onto Keith’s wrists. The cuffs locked by themselves, turned a few times, then glowed blue. The light on the cuffs faded after a few moments. Keith squirmed as his arms were restrained uncomfortably behind his back, pulling at his injured shoulder.

Lance let go not long later, and Keith took a deep breath as he was released from the wall. Keith turned to face Lance, that wretched traitor, when suddenly a powerful force pulled Keith backwards, the cuffs latching to the wall. Keith yelped as Lance let go of the button on his watch. “What the hell was that?”

"The cuffs are magnetic.” Lance said. Keith seethed at the pain the cuffs caused to his shoulder, glaring at Lance. “Just don’t hit me with a chair and it won’t happen again.” Lance said and turned to organize the papers that Keith had managed to mess up in his escape. He sat down at the desk, like the pretentious prick he was, and began decoding more papers, pencil writing furiously in a notebook while the computer decoded the new information from the castle Lance had stored on the hard drive. Keith tried getting up to stop him a few times, but realized the new cuffs weren't going to detach. He slumped in defeat and watched Lance work as if Keith wasn’t there at all.

“You’re just going to sit there and steal all that information with me here?”

“That’s the plan.”

“You’re insane. What did Allura and the rest of the team ever do to you? What did I ever do to you?”

Lance stopped writing to look at Keith. “They did absolutely nothing, and neither did you.” He returned to his work.

“Then why are you doing this, Lance? To destroy Voltron? To destroy the universe?”

“I’m not going to destroy Voltron, if that’s what you think. But that castle of Allura’s holds a whole lot of useful information, and not just on Altea. I’m doing this for me, Keith.” Lance answered without looking up from his work.

“Yeah, but— “

“Would you just shut up?” Lance stopped and let out an annoyed sigh, rubbing his temples. “Or I swear to god I’m going to launch you into a black hole.”

Keith snorted. “Now you know how I feel around you.” Lance ignored this and continued his work silently. Keith took to looking around the room as his former teammate ignored him for his schemes. His eyes eventually landed on the picture of Lance’s family, and his lips tightened. He counted twelve people in total. Lance stood in the middle, a pair of twin boys on his left and two little kids, a boy and smaller girl, were on his right. His mom and dad, Keith guessed, stood behind him. Lance’s father’s hand rested around his mother’s waist. A larger, older lady stood next to Lance’s father, Lance’s grandmother, presumably. She looked very good for her age, not hunched over, but the white hair and the prominent wrinkles on her face gave it away. Two more older women and an older man stood to the far right. A woman who didn’t look much older than Lance was on the far left.

“This is about your family, isn’t it?” Lance froze, his fist clenching around the pen. Keith knew he was right. There was nothing Lance wanted to do more than go home, and to go to such lengths to get there…

“Allura has been lying to us, okay?” Lance said, surprising Keith with his harsh tone. “She told us there was no way to get back to Earth but with the information I’ve decoded for the past month, there is a way. And she hasn’t told us. She’s trying to keep us here, with Voltron, so we can avenge her father and her entire race’s legacy. She’s holding us hostage in space and we don’t even know it!” Lance slammed his fist into the table, making papers and maps shake and fall off the edge. He took deep, heaving breaths and set his pen down. “I just want to go home, and she won’t even let me have that.”

Keith felt a pang of pity. “Okay Lance, but you put the entire team in danger just to get that information. What if the Galra get their hands on those hard drives?”

“They won’t. They’re heavily encrypted, and the Galra won’t be able to decipher Earth languages. But once I get back to Earth, and I will, all this information will go straight to the Garrison. That way, we can avoid another Kerberos mission and be able to defend ourselves against threats like the Galra.” Lance said every detail with confidence. He had planned this. He knew he’d be able to get the information from the castle’s database, and he somehow knew there’d be a way to get home. Maybe he already knew how to get back to Earth. He was just waiting, giving himself more time to avoid suspicion and cover his tracks. Keith couldn’t believe he had worked with this guy all this time. Lance was all full of tricks and deception, and it had passed over everyone’s head.

“Wait, Lance, no! You can’t just give away all of that information, not just about Voltron, but about Altea too. Allura’s not going to— “

“Forget Allura. She lied to us. She doesn’t deserve our mercy.” Keith gritted his teeth, holding back the millions of insults he wanted to shout at Lance. How could Lance be so stubborn and closed-minded? What would happen once the Garrison got their greedy hands on that Altean information and Lance’s decoded version? What would happen to Allura and Coran, who were aliens on Earth? What would happen to Shiro, who had miraculously returned after disappearing for more than a year? What would happen to Pidge and Hunk, two cadets who had gone missing from the Garrison? It would surely cause an uproar. And to Keith, it would’ve all been Lance’s fault.

But Keith guessed that Lance didn’t care for anyone but himself. When Lance would get back to Earth, he would be recognized as a universal hero, as both a paladin of Voltron and Earth’s savior from the Galra. He’d have his family, he’d have his fame, but…

What about his friends?


End file.
